Frostborn: The Shadow Prison (Frostborn #15)

by Jonathan Moeller

  Somewhere on the western half of the northern wall, another siege tower exploded, fire and debris tumbling in all directions. Antenora and Gavin must still be working their way down the ramparts, attacking the siege towers one by one. But Arandar barely noticed it through the screams and howls and clanging steel before the ruined gate.

  It was the most appalling slaughter he had seen in all his years as a soldier and a knight. The medvarth died in droves, attacking with suicidal ferocity. The men of Andomhaim and the orcs kept falling back, ceding more and more of the Forum to the enemy.

  “We will not be able to hold here!” said Corbanic.

  “We have to,” said Arandar. “If they get past the Forum we’ll retreat back to the Citadel. If that happens, we’ll lose the walls and we’ll lose the entire city. The dwarves and the manetaurs might have to assault the walls themselves when they arrive.”

  If they arrived. No. Arandar could not dwell on that.

  “It’s going to happen, your Majesty,” said Corbanic, his voice grim.

  “The medvarth have to break soon,” said Arandar. He could not imagine that even the medvarth warriors would continue to stand and fight in the face of such carnage. “Even if we must rebuild the gate with medvarth carcasses, we cannot fall back here.”

  But he feared that Corbanic was correct. The sheer mass of the medvarth assault was telling, and the men-at-arms and the Anathgrimm could not hold forever. Especially if Lord Commander Kajaldrakthor sent his frost drakes to attack the Forum, or if Imaria had another trick up her black-armored sleeve.

  Then he caught a flash of blue within the press of the medvarth.

  “High King!” said Mara. “The cogitaers!”

  “Magistri!” said Arandar, looking for Master Vesilius. He found the Master of the Magistri and a few others of the Order standing nearby, casting defensive spells.

  They acted an instant too late.

  There was a flash of blue fire, and a volley of razor-edged shards of ice, each one as long as a ballista bolt, hurtled out of the medvarth lines. The magical blast ripped through the lines of the men-at-arms, killing a score of them in an instant, and opening a hole in the shield wall.

  The medvarth roared and charged forward, and suddenly Arandar had to fight for his life.

  Excalibur burned in his grasp, the hilt in both hands, and he attacked the first medvarth that reached him. The medvarth raised its shield, trusting in the thick slab of wood and steel for its defense, and Excalibur sliced the shield in half as easily as if it had been a loaf of bread. Arandar just had time to see the astonished expression, strange on the medvarth’s ursine face, and then Excalibur found the creature’s heart.

  Arandar led the countercharge against the breakthrough, Master Marhand on his right and Dux Constantine on his left. Both men were Swordbearers, their soulblades Torchbrand and Hopesinger lending them superhuman strength and speed. Excalibur granted Arandar the same advantages, and the sword’s ancient magic, older than Andomhaim itself, let the weapon slice through nearly anything, and it was a devastating advantage against the medvarth warriors. Neither armor nor medvarth flesh and bone slowed Excalibur’s edge, and Arandar carved through them. Soon more men-at-arms and Anathgrimm warriors rushed to fill the gap, and the breach was closed.

  Yet the medvarth now filled nearly a third of the Forum, and the tide showed no sign of slowing. Even the ferocious Anathgrimm were being forced back, the medvarth scrambling over the corpses of their own dead to hew at their enemies. There hadn’t been time to prepare barricades in the streets, and soon the medvarth would spill over into the side streets off the Forum of the North and the northern wall. That would be disastrous. They could run amok through the streets, or climb to the ramparts and attack the defenders fighting at the battlements.

  “Sir Corbanic,” said Arandar. He had to shout over the roar of the fighting. “If we have any messengers left, send them to the rest of the city. Tell the knights and the decurions commanding the reserves to be ready to fight in the streets. We might have to hold the enemy street by street. If…”

  There was another blast of magical ice, the jagged shards ripping through the shield wall, and again the medvarth surged forward.

  ###

  Mara drew on the power of her blood, on the song that replaced the song of the Traveler and the Artificer and the Warden and the other dark elven lords that had once threatened to dominate her.

  Qhazulak would not approve, but she had no choice. With the Sight, she had noticed a group of cogitaers take shelter behind a pile of rubble, and they were throwing spells into the defenders. The fight was dire enough without the men-at-arms trying to defend themselves from battle magic, and while the Magistri could defend from enemy spells, they could not strike back.

  Which meant Mara had to strike back for them.

  Blue fire swallowed the world, and when it faded, Mara found herself standing behind five cogitaers. As ever, the delicate creatures floated a few inches off the ground, gray robes rippling as blue fire and icy white mist danced around their slender fingers. Her Sight noted the flows of power mixing together into another spell, the cogitaers’ attention focused on their attack.

  They didn’t notice her presence until she stepped forward and plunged her short sword and dagger into the back of the nearest cogitaer. The creature let out a shriek, and Mara ripped her blades free and attacked again, stabbing her short sword into the back of a second cogitaer. As she yanked her sword loose, the three remaining creatures whirled to face her, and the nearby medvarth roared, raising their swords.

  Mara drew on her power and vanished.

  She reappeared on the rampart, at the very edge of the destruction. It was a bit like standing on the edge of a jagged cliff. From here she saw the cogitaers trying to find her, saw the medvarth seeking for her, but none of them thought to look up. After a moment, the medvarth resumed their charge into the bloody melee, and the cogitaers started casting their spells again.

  Mara took a deep breath and drew on her power.

  She reappeared behind the cogitaers, just where she intended, her arms already driving her weapons forward. She killed one of the cogitaers, ripped her weapons free, and cut down another. The final cogitaer turned to face her, raising its hands in a spell, and Mara drew on her power once again.

  But it was a short trip. Mara reappeared two yards away, right behind the cogitaer, and killed the creature before it knew that she was there.

  More magical power surged before her Sight, and her head snapped around. She saw three Frostborn about a hundred yards away. They had spotted her and were joining together their magic for a spell of killing frost.

  Mara drew on her power and traveled away an instant before a volley of razor-edged ice shards struck the pile of rubble where she and the cogitaers had been standing. She reappeared back in the Forum and noted with satisfaction that the Frostborn had just wiped out a score of their own warriors with the misaimed spell.

  The medvarth were pushing further into the Forum. The Magistri had joined their powers, casting a shimmering wall of light over the struggling men and orcs to shield them from further magical attacks. Arandar and the other Swordbearers had joined the fight, hammering at the enemy every time they tried to break through the shield wall.

  They were holding, but they would not hold much longer. Mara heard the clatter of armor and the shouts of men as more reinforcements came to the Forum of the North. The Forum would turn into a slaughterhouse as the entire host of Andomhaim struggled against the wrath of the Frostborn.

  “My Queen,” rumbled Qhazulak, his massive axe in his hands. “What are your wishes?”

  “Get Zhorlacht and the other wizards here,” said Mara. “Have them throw their spells at the medvarth. We’ll need every bit of help we can get to hold here. If the Frostborn…when the Frostborn get into the city, we’ll have hours of bloody fighting.”

  And they might not be able to win that kind of fight.

  Qhazulak snarled an or
der to another Anathgrimm, and the younger warrior sprinted off. Mara desperately wanted to go find Jager, to make sure that he was safe, but she was needed here.

  But she had absolutely no doubt that Jager was making himself useful in the battle.

  ###

  Jager had noticed something, years ago.

  In a crisis, in a battle or a disaster or a fire or whatever, people wanted someone to tell them what to do. If you put on an air of authority, if you took charge and gave orders in a confident matter, people did what you told them to do. Jager had exploited that during some of his more daring thefts several times.

  Ridmark had been good at that. He had either been so confident or feigned confidence so well that people had been glad to follow his commands. Come to think of it, he had been so confident that he had gotten both Calliande and Morigna to fall in love with him at the same time, and knowing Ridmark he had not been trying to seduce either woman. He had been more focused on trying to stop the return of the Frostborn and getting himself killed to atone for the death of his wife.

  Hopefully, he had gotten over that by now.

  “Move!” shouted Jager, running with the Anathgrimm before the causeway leading to the gates of the Citadel.

  His newly acquired men-at-arms leaped to obey.

  He had been in the Great Cathedral supervising the preparation of the hospital, preparing blankets and bandages for the wounded men that would soon undoubtedly fill the city. Then the northern gate had exploded, and now there were a dozen frost drakes circling over the city, breathing death at everything that moved. Jager wasn’t sure how the drakes had gotten past the magical defenses, and at the moment he did not care.

  Something had to be done. The High King had left groups of men-at-arms scattered around the city, equipped with those portable ballistae on the little carts, but Jager realized they had to be concentrated to have any chance of hitting a drake. He had been able to convince the men-at-arms of that.

  It helped that he had a dozen Anathgrimm warriors of the Queen’s Guard with him, led by a hulking orc named Khorzuuk. Khorzuuk had neither imagination nor a sense of humor but possessed the admirable virtue of following orders to the letter. Since Mara had told Khorzuuk to do whatever Jager commanded, he had gotten along splendidly with the humorless warrior.

  Jager ran towards the center of the Forum of the Crown, Khorzuuk and the Anathgrimm following him. Of the dozen men-at-arms Jager had collected, the highest-ranking was a grizzled old decurion named Martin. The old man had seen every major campaign in the last twenty years and seemed to regard the attack of the Frostborn with irritated equanimity. That was good. Jager couldn’t always be the only man to keep his head in a crisis.

  “Here, lord Prince?” said Martin.

  “Aye, this’ll do,” said Jager. “Set up right here. Those winged lizards seem to like taking runs at the Citadel. Well, let’s make them regret that.”

  The men-at-arms went to work, slotting bolts into the ballistae and winding the weapons. Jager did have to admire the ingenuity of the design. The portable ballistae were like big crossbows but could throw bolts with enough force to punch through a drake’s armored scales. Of course, Jager could have gotten Arandar the iron for the weapons and the wood for the stocks at a far more reasonable price, but one could not do everything.

  The last of the ballistae clicked into place.

  “Ready,” said Martin.

  “All right,” said Jager.

  He scanned the sky, looking for an opponent.

  It did not take long. A frost drake came into sight, circling around the spires of the Tower of the Magistri, its great wings billowing as it bore itself aloft. Jager saw the gray-armored form of a Frostborn warrior upon the creature’s back, and even from a distance, he saw the warrior’s sudden jolt of alarm at the sight of a neat row of enemy artillery.

  “Here it comes!” said Martin.

  The frost drake banked, white mist glimmering around its fangs.

  “Now!” said Jager.

  In unison, the men-at-arms pointed their weapons and released.

  Three of the bolts missed. That was the weakness with the portable ballistae. It was hard to aim them quickly, especially when watching a frost drake hurtle towards you. That was why Jager had gathered this bunch together, because while three of the bolts missed, the other three did not. Two of them punched into the frost drake’s neck, while the third shot through its left wing, tearing a wide hole in the leathery material. The frost drake screamed in pain, its plume of freezing breath shooting harmlessly into the air, and its right wing collapsed. The huge creature jerked to the side with enough force that the Frostborn warrior lost his saddle and tumbled towards the ground.

  “Make sure he doesn’t get up!” said Jager, and Khorzuuk nodded and raced forward with his warriors.

  For a moment, Jager feared the frost drake would crash into them, but the creature hit the Forum with a crunching noise. He heard the massive bones of its neck snap, and the drake shuddered once and went slack, its wings unfurling and its tail lying limp like a giant serpent. Jager looked to the left, fearing that the Frostborn warrior might try to work some magic, but the warrior was dead. If the crash hadn’t killed him, getting dismembered by Khorzuuk and his men would have done the trick.

  “Good shooting, lads,” said Martin. “Get those weapons reloaded. I think the Prince has in mind for us to shoot more drakes.”

  “Damn right,” said Jager.

  Khorzuuk and the Anathgrimm jogged over. “I have a request, consort of Queen Mara.”

  “Aye?” said Jager, looking at the sky again. Two more frost drakes headed towards the Great Cathedral. Well, if they passed over the Forum of the Crown, they would regret it.

  “My warriors and I wish to claim the scales of the frost drake,” said Khorzuuk. “Its scales would make a fine trophy, and would likely serve as stronger armor as well.”

  Jager glanced at Martin, who shrugged.

  “Let them have the damned thing,” said Martin.

  “Well, Khorzuuk,” said Jager, “you can have as many frost drakes as we can shoot down. So let’s go find some more, shall we?”

  ###

  Arandar cut down another medvarth, and then still another, and then sliced off the head of a locusari warrior that had reared up on its hind legs to attack. Around him, the Swordbearers of his guard struggled, as did the chief nobles of the realm who had accompanied him to the Forum of the North. The Anathgrimm of the Queen’s Guard battled against the tide, Qhazulak lopping limbs and heads from the medvarth with that massive axe of his. Mara flickered in and out of the battle with pulses of blue fire, cutting down the cogitaers whenever they appeared. Despite her efforts, a steady volley of spells rose from the medvarth horde, and the Magistri labored to maintain a ward, a wall of flickering white light cutting across the Forum of the North. The ward of the Magistri held back the magical attacks the Frostborn and the cogitaers, but it did nothing for the men struggling on the ramparts.

  They had been driven nearly halfway across the Forum of the North, and before too much longer they would be pushed onto the Via Borealis, the street that led from the Forum of the North to the Forum of the Crown at the base of the Citadel itself. Already companies of locusari and medvarth had broken off the main force and rushed along the street leading below the northern wall. Troops of Anathgrimm and men-at-arms hurried to meet them, and so far, the medvarth had been kept from the ramparts, but Arandar knew that would not last.

  Through slow attrition, the Frostborn were winning.

  Victory might cost the Frostborn half their army, but in the end, they would break Tarlion’s defenses.

  Arandar had to hold here. He did not know when Ridmark would arrive with the dwarves and the manetaurs, but Arandar had to hold until then.

  But if the Dragon Knight did not hurry, he would arrive to rescue a city of corpses.

  Arandar killed another medvarth and stepped back, breathing hard, his shoulders and arms burning
with the effort of fighting. He looked around, gauging the progress of the battle. Mountains of slain medvarth and locusari filled the Forum of the North, but step by step the soldiers of the Frostborn continued their relentless advance.

  He sought for Corbanic, hoping to tell the Constable to prepare to fall back to the Via Borealis, and blue fire swirled next to him. Mara stepped out of the flames, breathing hard, both her armor and her weapons spattered with pale cogitaer blood.

  “A spell,” said Mara, trying to catch her breath as the blue fire faded from her veins and eyes. “The Frostborn are casting a spell.”

  Arandar nodded. “The Magistri are warding against it.”

  “That won’t be enough,” said Mara. “I think they’re getting ready to repeat the spell they used earlier, the one to raise the dead as revenants.”

  Arandar looked at her with alarm, and then at the horde of medvarth pouring through the broken gate. The dead were everywhere, corpses lying on the ramparts and carpeting the Forum, thousands more of them outside the walls. If the Frostborn raised them all as revenants now, with the magical defenses broken, it would be a telling blow. Worse, with the magical defenses gone, the revenants could crawl right up the wall, just as they had at Dun Calpurnia.

  They might have no choice but to withdraw to the Citadel.

  “It…” Arandar started to say, and then blue fire exploded outside the walls.

  The great ring of blue flame rolled across the battlefield, as it had before, the ghostly fire lingering in the eyes of the slain medvarths and khaldjari. But this time, the ring of blue fire passed through the walls themselves, leaping up to land upon the dead men and medvarth warriors on the ramparts.

  The dead medvarths near Arandar started to stir.

  He attacked at once, ripping Excalibur through the throat of one dead medvarth and then another, destroying the dark magic that animated them before it could take hold. But around him, hundreds of more revenants rose from the dead that filled the Forum, and the lines of the battle dissolved into total chaos.